RICHMOND – Police arrested two protesters blocking a gate at the Kinder Morgan Terminal in Richmond on Monday orning, during a demonstration against the company’s planned expansion of the Trans Mountain Tar Sands Pipeline in Canada.
After the arrests at about 10 a.m., two other gates were still blocked at the facility on Canal Boulevard, but police said they would not be taking any others into custody.
Early Monday, about a dozen protesters had secured themselves to oil barrels and had 12-foot-long mock oil pipelines at the three gates to Kinder Morgan. A few tanker trucks appeared to be waiting to get in. Police had to cut through the protesters’ locks to open an entrance that was in a public roadway.
Stardust Doherty from San Francisco sings a protest song as firefighters cut through the pipe covering his and another protester’s hands as they extricate them from blocking a gate at the Kinder Morgan terminal in Richmond, Calif., on Monday, July 24, 2017. (Laura A. Oda/Bay Area News Group)
“Our main goal is to ensure safety of the people in the facility,” said Richmond police Lt. Felix Tan. “We need to make sure that fire trucks and paramedics are able to gain access to the facility.”
The protesters, from Rainforest Action Network and Idle No More SF Bay, maintain that refining the crude oil in Richmond would worsen air pollution in local communities, and they say that “any spills of tar sands crude would be nearly impossible to clean up because when tar sands oil spills in water – it sinks.”
“It’s important for me to stand up today for my indigenous brothers and sisters of the First Nations,” said Isabella Zizi of Idle No More SF Bay. “This crude tar sands oil will not just be affecting those up in Canada.
“It will likely be transported to the West Coast and potentially to here in my hometown of Richmond. Our lands, our waterways and our air needs are constantly being overlooked by these industries. We, as indigenous people, cannot and should not be swept under the rug. If any of these elements are harmed, all life will suffer the consequences.”
A spokesman for Kinder Morgan said by email Monday that the company had no comment on the protest.
The company’s Trans Mountain pipeline expansion would increase capacity to 890,000 barrels a day, of an existing pipeline between Alberta to British Columbia.
Staff photographer Laura Oda contributed to this story.
[Top photo:
RICHMOND – Police arrested two protesters blocking a gate at the Kinder Morgan Terminal in Richmond on Monday morning, during a demonstration against the company’s planned expansion of the Trans Mountain Tar Sands Pipeline in Canada.
After the arrests at about 10 a.m., two other gates were still blocked at the facility on Canal Boulevard, but police said they would not be taking any others into custody.
Early Monday, about a dozen protesters had secured themselves to oil barrels and had 12-foot-long mock oil pipelines at the three gates to Kinder Morgan. A few tanker trucks appeared to be waiting to get in. Police had to cut through the protesters’ locks to open an entrance that was in a public roadway.
Stardust Doherty from San Francisco sings a protest song as firefighters cut through the pipe covering his and another protester’s hands as they extricate them from blocking a gate at the Kinder Morgan terminal in Richmond, Calif., on Monday, July 24, 2017. (Laura A. Oda/Bay Area News Group)
“Our main goal is to ensure safety of the people in the facility,” said Richmond police Lt. Felix Tan. “We need to make sure that fire trucks and paramedics are able to gain access to the facility.”
The protesters, from Rainforest Action Network and Idle No More SF Bay, maintain that refining the crude oil in Richmond would worsen air pollution in local communities, and they say that “any spills of tar sands crude would be nearly impossible to clean up because when tar sands oil spills in water – it sinks.”
“It’s important for me to stand up today for my indigenous brothers and sisters of the First Nations,” said Isabella Zizi of Idle No More SF Bay. “This crude tar sands oil will not just be affecting those up in Canada.
“It will likely be transported to the West Coast and potentially to here in my hometown of Richmond. Our lands, our waterways and our air needs are constantly being overlooked by these industries. We, as indigenous people, cannot and should not be swept under the rug. If any of these elements are harmed, all life will suffer the consequences.”
A spokesman for Kinder Morgan said by email Monday that the company had no comment on the protest.
The company’s Trans Mountain pipeline expansion would increase capacity to 890,000 barrels a day, of an existing pipeline between Alberta to British Columbia.
Staff photographer Laura Oda contributed to this story.
[Top photo: RICHMOND – Police arrested two protesters blocking a gate at the Kinder Morgan Terminal in Richmond on Monday morning, during a demonstration against the company’s planned expansion of the Trans Mountain Tar Sands Pipeline in Canada. After the arrests at about 10 a.m., two other gates were still blocked at the facility on Canal Boulevard, but police said they would not be taking any others into custody. Early Monday, about a dozen protesters had secured themselves to oil barrels and had 12-foot-long mock ]
